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Navman S30 satnav

Cheerful as well as cheap

Review With everyone from Alpine to Via Michelin offering standalone satellite navigation kit, should you bother with a competitively-priced, lower-end offering from an established brand name? We hit the streets with the entry-level Navman S30 to find out.

The S30 is at the very bottom of Navman's new S series and comes in at an affordable RRP of £149, although it goes without saying a bit of judicious internet shopping can find the product at an even more attractive £130.

Navman's S30: completely redesigned

It's not the thinnest satnav on the market but at 20mm thick it is slim. And it doesn't look bad in its black and grey plastic livery. Put it this way, there's nothing to fall out with as far as the appearance goes.

Navman claims the S series has been completely redesigned from the inside out, following extensive research and input from its customers. This will be welcome news for folk dissatisfied with Navman's previous products, which were be sometimes slow and a little fiddly to use.

The windshield mount is robust

Still, £150 isn't chump-change in the increasingly competitive satnav market, so what do you get for your money? In the box, you get the S30 with its 3.5in touchscreen; a windshield mount that works on a clip-down sucker that we'd definitely describe as robust; a cigarette-lighter power cord; a cloth case that will offer only the flimsiest protection; a mini USB cable for PC hook-up; a slim quick start guide; a seriously hefty "Legal Information" booklet; and, finally, a DVD-ROM that holds the NavDesk desktop software and global map data.